WHO: The Library of Congress is collaborating
with the American Historical Association and the
Community College Humanities Association in this
project. Also cooperating are the African
Studies Association, the Association for Asian
Studies, the Latin American Studies Association,
the Conference on Latin American History, the
Middle East Studies Association and the World
History Association. The Ford Foundation is
funding the project.

BACKGROUND

The seminar "Globalizing Regional Studies" is
the first phase of a two-part project whose
overall aim is to use the discipline of history,
particularly world history, to stimulate new
ways of thinking about area studies. Seminar
participants will attend workshops conducted
by leading scholars in fields such as
cross-cultural trade, migration and diaspora,
gender, biological and cultural exchange and
democratization and civil society. In addition,
participants will work on individual research
projects using the Library's collections.

The seminar will bring together approximately 30
faculty members who teach world history,
literature and related subjects at community
colleges around the nation. Seminar co-directors
are Jerry Bentley of the University of Hawaii
and Charles Evans of Northern Virginia Community
College. Les Vogel of the Library of Congress is
director of research. The seminar's seven guest
lecturers will demonstrate how they broadened
their own research and thereby contributed to a
reconceptualization of area studies in the
context of an emerging global environment. The
guest lecturers are John McNeill of Georgetown
University, Patrick Manning of Northeastern
University, Patricia Seed of Rice University,
Margaret Strobel of the University of Illinois
at Chicago, Stanley Katz of Princeton
University, Edmund (Terry) Burke of the
University of California at Santa Cruz and James
Tracy of the University of Minnesota.